Copyright Statement

Abstract

We review the literature to distinguish reports of vertebrate
wildlife disease emergence with sufficient evidence,
enabling a robust assessment of emergence
drivers. For potentially emerging agents that cannot
be confirmed, sufficient data on prior absence (or a prior
difference in disease dynamics) are frequently lacking.
Improved surveillance, particularly for neglected host
taxa, geographical regions and infectious agents, would
enable more effective management should emergence
occur. Exposure to domestic sources of infection and
human-assisted exposure to wild sources were identified
as the two main drivers of emergence across host
taxa; the domestic source was primary for fish while the
wild source was primary for other taxa. There was
generally insufficient evidence for major roles of other
hypothesized drivers of emergence.